


The Better World Job

by patchworkgirl



Category: Leverage
Genre: don't mind me, therapeutic flash fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-11
Updated: 2016-11-11
Packaged: 2018-08-30 07:49:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8524669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/patchworkgirl/pseuds/patchworkgirl
Summary: Meanwhile, in a gentler universe, a job is discussed. Warning: Not even really veiled political references





	

“How do you take down a man who can do no wrong?” It was a rhetorical question that no one moved to answer, and for a few moments the only sound was a soft swirl of lousy Irish whiskey in a coffee mug.

“You put him in jail, right?” Parker peeked over Hardison's shoulder again as she spoke. “Just looking at his bank account is pretty much a list of crimes. Weird crimes, too.” Her nose wrinkled in uncomfortable confusion. Nothing wrong with crime, but... She settled back into her perch on the back of the couch, balanced on the balls of her feet and eating peanut butter pretzels from a five pound jar.

“Not enough.” Nate shook his head. “Oh, in the short term, it helps. Better than nothing. But for the true believers, it's just one more piece of the conspiracy.”

“See, I wish you was just bein' all evocative an' lapsed Catholic with that true believer stuff, but it a pretty apt description.” Hardison didn't look up from his screen, which he was giving a more exaggerated version of Parker's look. “It basically a cult at this point. The Cool Aidey kind.”

“Dammit, Hardison, not a punchline.” Eliot did an eyebrow thing from his place, an achingly casual lean against a door frame that betrayed just how on edge he was. “You were what, ten years old for Heaven's Gate? Not funny then, less funny now.”

“Not a punchline,” Sophie agreed from the mirror, where she was unpinning an icy blond wig that made her look older trying to look younger. “But he's still right. There's nothing you could reveal, no well deserved and legally inescapable fate or dark secret that could turn the tide. He's not a person to them; he's an aspiration. And if you want to be someone and they're profoundly reprehensible by any logical measure, you need to redefine logic, and reprehensibility at that, if you want to keep your dream.”

“But they're not all like that,” Parker said around a crummy mouthful. “I was reading the internet.”

“Don't do that.”

“Way to be, Mama.”

Parker ignored Hardison and Eliot's simultaneous interjections. “Some of them are the stuff Sophie said, but some of them know he's a bad guy. They just think he's a bad guy who'll get them what they want and he's worth it. That's way more normal.”

“They're not our problem,” Eliot said distantly. He knew a lot of those people, the ones who imagined they'd be saved from the spectre of change, from their grandfather's job at the plant having been lost before they were even born into an empty economy, from a world that didn't give a damn about them that they just wanted to strike back the way God and tradition said they should. He didn't see them anymore, wouldn't have been recognized by them, but he came from where he came from, good and bad. 

“No, no, Parker's right. The true believers, we'll call them, and the pragmatists are both factors here.” Nate stood, moving toward an arbitrary wall. The nearest screen flickered to life a moment later, but they didn't really maintain the kind of briefing room he was performing for anymore. Hardison improvised, knowing the man did best with a stage. “What might destroy him for one might shore him up with the other. Nothing but a crushing defeat fixes any of this.”

“I don't even know how much that will help,” Sophie said, softer than was her wont. If she was acting, it might have been for her own benefit.

“So how do you wreck a church?” It was one of those times it was hard to say whether Parker meant to be weird or not. “True believers and people who just want stuff. Same thing, basically, right?”

“One week where I don't wind up in a conversation with you goin'a hell written all over it...”

“Think that's called a Crusade, and I didn't bring my halberd.”

This time it was Nate who ignored the boys. “Traditionally? Introduce a competitor.”

“I think one hateful incompetent is more than enough, and if we wanted to try a Novosibirsk Triple Agent we ought to have started months ago.” Sophie frowned. 

“Not enough.” Nate shook his head, but that manic spark was rising in his eyes. “Yacuiba Special.”

“You need a competing conspiracy theory?” Hardison didn't look impressed.

“No, we need a competing conspiracy. A new mythology, overtake the old. Eliot, call up that Russian with the weird squint.”

“Y'know, that cheekbone thing is the least terrifying scar that woman has.”

He didn't miss a beat. “Sophie, get us Tara and get me a list of doors at consulates you two can open between you. Parker--”

“Aren't you retired? I thought you were just consulting.”

“I'll retire again on Tuesday. You said you had three ways into his house. Pick the one that'll work best for you and at least two accomplices. Hardison, call your friend back, let him know we're taking the job.”

“He ain't actually a friend, man. I met him one time when I was nine. He know my Nana from community organization days.”

“I can't believe you didn't tell me you were friends.” Parker hopped down to follow him out of the room. “Do we get a red phone?”

“Baby, you want a phone that's red, gimme like ten minutes in the work room.”

“Ooh, did you ever pet Bo?”

“Do you go to near-strangers' houses and pet their dogs?”

“I break into at least three houses a week to pet their dogs. How come we never visited?”

“You told me you broke in there twice.”

“Yeah, but it's neat when people let me in the front door. You can see so many pieces of the security system.”

As their voices faded, Nate dropped back into Hardison's overly complicated recliner and saluted his wife with his mug. It'd be okay. "Let's go steal the future," he said, just quietly to himself.


End file.
